Existing legal guidelines for safeguarding animals and wildlife needs to be made eco-centric, says Justice Jayasankaran Nambiar

Kerala High Court decide Justice Jayasankaran Nambiar mentioned on Saturday that present legal guidelines to guard animals and wildlife have been anthropocentric in nature and needs to be reimagined into changing into eco-centric, so all judges may interpret these legal guidelines extra uniformly. He was collaborating in a panel dialogue, ‘Environmental Policy and Law within the Nilgiri Biosphere Reserve’, on the third day of the NilgiriScapes Conference at Udhagamandalam within the Nilgiris.

At the panel, which additionally had senior attorneys B.J. Krishnan and Sanjay Upadhyay, Justice Nambiar mentioned: “There isn’t any absolute fact on this world. Everything that you simply hear is an opinion and every little thing you see is perspective. Therefore, if you find yourself referred to as upon to interpret regulation, you convey your life experiences into the equation, and that you must interpret regulation in a way that appeals to you. This is the place the issue begins on the subject of environmental laws and interpretation of environmental laws.”

Justice Nambiar mentioned each the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act, 1960, and the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972, have been each anthropocentric as they “prioritise human beings” over different species. “There is a way of domination of the people over all different species,” he mentioned.

The decide remarked that the primary actually eco-centric laws that was handed within the nation was The Biodiversity Act, 2002. He identified that whereas the Wildlife Protection Act was amended not too long ago to incorporate extra species within the Scheduled Lists of Species, protected underneath the regulation, the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act had remained unamended since 1960.

‘Conflicting ideas’

“So, now we have a blended bag of legislations that we’re referred to as upon to interpret. We have an anthropocentric laws, side-by-side with an eco-centric one. What is the philosophy that’s speculated to information the interpretation in regulation? We can all agree that eco-centrism doesn’t gel with anthropocentrism as a philosophy. They are mutually contradictory,” he mentioned.

Justice Nambiar added that it was of little shock that when judges have been referred to as on to interpret these legal guidelines, their view factors differed relying on their lived experiences. “So, should you actually wish to have a uniform software and philosophy of the legal guidelines, what you want is a re-imagination or an modification of our laws, masking all these areas and allow them to be eco-centric all by means of,” he mentioned.

Understanding wildlife

Referencing Argentinian feminist thinker, Maria Cristina Lugones’ technique of ‘world travelling’, Justice Nambiar mentioned understanding ‘the opposite’, which within the context of his speech can be wildlife, was an necessary facet within the software of legal guidelines as effectively.

“She (Lugones) mentioned it could be encouraging if everyone adopted a world-traveller method. Now, if you really journey the world and should you’re actually abroad and one other tradition, you’ll attempt to mingle with the individuals and perceive the peculiar points of their tradition and traditions. Most importantly, you’ll respect them. If we had the same method in direction of understanding ‘the opposite’ in our society, and within the context by which I’m talking, if we perceive different species, that angle would go a good distance in fixing the issues, particularly almost about fixing human-animal battle,” Justice Nambiar added.